The author of the book Online Afterlives describes the unusual projects of people like Eugenia Kuyda, co-founder of Luka, an AI-powered chat simulator that books restaurant reservations and makes recommendations. Kuyda worked with computer scientists to convert several thousand text messages between deceased tech entrepreneur Roman Mazurenko and his friends and relatives into a chatbot simulation: “How are you there?” asks…
Tag: messages
Italian Mobile Operator Offers To Replace SIM Cards After Massive Data Breach
Ho Mobile, an Italian mobile operator, owned by Vodafone, has confirmed a massive data breach on Monday and is now taking the rare step of offering to replace the SIM cards of all affected customers. From a report: The breach is believed to have impacted roughly 2.5 million customers. It first came to light last month on December 28 when a…
Alphabet Unit Wing Blasts New US Drone ID Rule, Citing Privacy
Alphabet’s drone delivery unit Wing criticized Trump administration rules issued this week mandating broadcast-based remote identification of drones, saying they should be revised to allow for internet-based tracking. From a report: On Monday, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued rules that will allow small drones to fly over people and at night in the United States and mandate remote identification technology…
Police Turn To Car Data To Destroy Suspects’ Alibis
In recent years, investigators have realized that automobiles — particularly newer models — can be treasure troves of digital evidence. Their onboard computers generate and store data that can be used to reconstruct where a vehicle has been and what its passengers were doing. From a report: They reveal everything from location, speed and acceleration to when doors were opened and…
BMW Backtracks: ‘We Do Not Draw on Warranty Status’ For Targeted Ads
BMW has told Motoring Research its targeted billboard warranty adverts — which are claimed to use number plate registration technology to tailor public adverts to BMW drivers — do not actually draw upon vehicle warranty status. From a report: Rather, only publically available information is used. “There is no personalisation visible on the advert and no vehicle or customer data is…
Signal Says Cellebrite Cannot Break Its Encryption
Signal, in a blog post: Yesterday, the BBC ran a story with the factually untrue headline, “Cellebrite claimed to have cracked chat app’s encryption.” This is false. Not only can Cellebrite not break Signal encryption, but Cellebrite never even claimed to be able to. Since we weren’t actually given the opportunity to comment in that story, we’re posting this to help…
Facebook’s Small Advertisers Say They’re Hurt by AI Lockouts
Small advertisers that rely on Facebook to spread marketing messages are up in arms over the social network’s automated ad systems, complaining that inflexible account blocking tools and a lack of customer assistance are hurting business. From a report: One digital marketer, Chris Raines, was setting up an advertising campaign on Facebook last week when his account abruptly stopped working. Raines…
Apple-Criticizing Banner Ads Now Added to Some of Facebook’s iOS Apps
Facebook added banner ads criticizing Apple into some of its iOS apps, 9to5Mac reports, in its ongoing war against Apple’s new privacy changes:
By tapping the Learn More button, the app opens an article written by Facebook in which the company says Apple’s policies announced at WWDC 2020 with iOS 14 will “harm the growth of business and the free internet.” Facebook…
Taiwanese Horror Game Pulled From Sale Again After Backlash in China
An award-winning Taiwanese horror game was removed from storefronts by the beleaguered developer CD Projekt Red amid a backlash from Chinese gamers, hours after it was put on sale. From a report: Devotion, a PC game that chronicles the life of a Taiwanese family in a religious cult in the 1980s, was released to critical acclaim in February 2019. But shortly…
Gmail Is Broken Right Now, One Day After a Massive Outage
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: While it doesn’t appear to be completely down like it was yesterday morning, we’re hearing many reports from Gmail users that the email service is having major issues right now. Some users are reporting that Gmail is particularly slow, while others are reporting constant error messages. One TechCrunch writer, meanwhile, noticed that emails…